Chapter 140: Fight
Lingzhou’s eyes darkened. He didn’t answer immediately. But he didn’t walk away either.
And that silence, heavy as it was, was the beginning of their unspoken pact.
Meanwhile, in the pit below, the boy with the rusted spear screamed as the serpent struck.
The crowd roared.
But in the shadows above, a new game had already begun.
A game of patience and knives hidden behind silk smiles. Of bait and traps, laid for the serpent not in the arena, but in the fortress’ heart.
Xu Mochen thought her a prize to be flaunted. He thought he was dragging her deeper into his web.
The serpent’s final hiss still echoed through the arena when Ling Yu’s decision crystallized.
The crowd’s laughter, the lords’ smug expressions, the anchor’s distant pulse. It all pressed against her chest until the fury inside could no longer be contained.
She didn’t wait for another scream, nor did she wait for Xu Mochen’s smarmy coaxing.
Instead, she vaulted over the railing.
The crowd gasped as her boots hit the sand with a thud. Her figure, cloaked in black combat gear, hair gleaming like spilled ink under the torchlight, was sharp and defiant against the bloodstained ground. She didn’t look like prey or like a spectacle. She looked like a predator stepping willingly into another predator’s cage.
Xu Mochen’s startled voice rang from the stands. "Yu’er—! What are you doing?!"
But Ling Yu ignored him.
Her sharp voice cut through the arena like a blade. "You call this strength? Throwing starving hunters and shackled children into the pit, just so you can drink and cheer from the sidelines?"
The jeers faltered. The crowd shifted uneasily, caught between indignation and intrigue. Ling Yu’s gaze swept across the private balconies where the faction lords sat in self-satisfied comfort. The torchlight gleamed in her eyes like cold stars.
"If you dare claim power, if you dare claim the right to decide who lives and who dies—then you should prove it yourselves."
Her words cracked like a whip.
The silence lasted a heartbeat. Then the uproar began.
"Is she insane?!"
"She challenged the lords!"
"Who does she think she is?!"
Xu Mochen leaned over the railing, face pale with fury. "Ling Yu! Get back here! This is no place for—"
But her voice drowned him out. "I challenge the faction lords. Each of you."
The declaration rolled across the arena, fueled by her bloodlust, by the murderous aura she didn’t bother to hide. It pressed on the crowd, on the lords, even on the monsters chained in the pens. For an instant, it was as if the underground pit belonged to her alone.
Her system pinged.
[New Hidden Quest Triggered: Duel of Thrones]
[Objective: Defeat the four faction lords in public combat.
Reward: Authority recognition, Anchor resonance disruption.
Penalty for Failure: Death.]
Fluffy’s panicked little voice chimed in.
[Master! Are you crazy?! This isn’t a duel, this is you slapping fate in the face!]
The system was far less subtle.
[Warning: User Ling Yu is engaging in high-risk behavior.
Success probability: 14%.
Adjusting adaptive calculations... probability increased to 32% due to Title synergy.]
Ling Yu’s lips curved in a cold smile. ’Good enough.’
The first to answer her was not Xu Mochen, but a man in crimson robes with a blade slung casually across his back. He was broad-shouldered, his expression twisted into mocking amusement.
"Big words for a little girl."
This was Lord Zhan Lei, leader of the Red Sabers faction, infamous for raiding refugee convoys and feeding survivors to the anchor when supplies ran low. His cruelty was legendary, his arrogance greater still.
He stood, tossing his cup aside. "Fine. I’ll play with you. The crowd wants blood—why not yours?"
The stands erupted into cheers.
Xu Mochen’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t stop it. Perhaps he thought she’d be broken and humiliated, crawling back to him.
Xie Lingzhou, from his balcony, leaned forward. His eyes narrowed, not in amusement, not in worry, but in the sharp attention of a predator watching another take the first strike.
Ling Yu’s blood sang.
Finally.
She raised her hand. A glint of steel flashed as her blade appeared, summoned from her inventory in a streak of silver light. The murmurs of the crowd grew louder; most had never seen such seamless access to space storage.
Zhan Lei dropped into the arena with a crash, sand spraying under his boots. He grinned, drawing his saber with a ringing note.
"Let’s see if you bleed prettier than the rest."
The fight began instantly.
Zhan Lei charged with the arrogance of a man who had never been denied, saber cleaving downward in a brutal arc. The sand exploded under the force of his strike, the blade whistling like a storm.
Ling Yu sidestepped. Her movements were precise, economical, as if she already knew his rhythm. Her blade flicked upward, slashing across his forearm before his saber even touched the ground.
Blood spurted.
The crowd gasped.
Zhan Lei snarled, more furious than wounded. "You—!"
He swung again, faster this time, saber whirling in wide arcs meant to overwhelm. Sparks burst where his strikes grazed the arena wall, the force sending gusts of wind through the pit.
But Ling Yu moved like water. She flowed around him, her blade cutting in quick, surgical strikes. A tendon here, a slice of muscle there. She wasn’t killing him quickly. She was dismantling him.
The divine beings in the stream chuckled, their voices overlapping in her mind.
[Goddess of War soars in excitement.]
[Ah, elegant. Crippling him piece by piece. She’s learned from us well.]
[Lord of Silent Graves is intrigued by the Streamer.]
[Not elegance. This is cruelty sharpened into an art.]
[Unnamed Cosmic Deity is satisfied by the ordeal.]
[Let her rage burn. This is only the beginning.]
Zhan Lei roared, swinging wildly, blood spraying with every motion. His power was brute force, but Ling Yu was precision incarnate.
Finally, with a twist of her blade, she severed the tendons in his sword arm. The saber dropped from his hand, clattering to the sand.
Ling Yu’s boot slammed into his chest, sending him sprawling. Her blade pressed to his throat.
"Your strength?" she spat. "This is what you call strength?"
The crowd fell silent.
Zhan Lei gurgled, face red with humiliation, but he couldn’t move.
Ling Yu turned, her voice carrying.
"One down. Who’s next?"
The stands erupted again, not with laughter this time, but with fevered shouts. Some cheered her audacity. Others cursed her defiance.
Xu Mochen’s smile had vanished completely.
The next lord rose reluctantly. Lady Bai Mei, leader of the White Lotus faction. She was draped in silks even here, her beauty flawless, her expression tight with disdain. Her weapon of choice was a whip, studded with hooks.
She descended into the pit with a dancer’s grace.
"This won’t end well for you, little wolf."
Ling Yu smirked. "Then come prove it."
The duel was different this time.
Bai Mei’s whip snapped like lightning, slicing through the sand in deadly arcs. Each strike tore gouges in the arena floor, the hooks designed to shred flesh.
Ling Yu’s blade danced, sparks flying as she deflected the whip against steel. But Bai Mei’s strikes weren’t just physical; they were psychological. The whip lashed close to Ling Yu’s face, meant to intimidate, to humiliate.
But Ling Yu had faced far worse.
Every near-miss only sharpened her focus. Every crack of the whip only stoked her rage.
Then she saw the opening.
The next time the whip snapped toward her, she twisted her blade around it, trapping the hooks against her weapon. With a savage pull, she yanked Bai Mei off balance.
In a heartbeat, Ling Yu closed the distance, fist slamming into the woman’s jaw with bone-cracking force.
Bai Mei crumpled to the sand, her silks stained with blood.
The crowd howled.
Ling Yu stood over her fallen opponent, cold and ruthless. "Two."
The remaining lords hesitated.
The arena, once their stage of cruelty, now belonged to Ling Yu.
Even Xu Mochen’s expression wavered between fury, calculation, and something like reluctant awe.
Ling Yu’s gaze swept the balconies again, her voice rising like a war drum.
"You play at power while others bleed for your amusement. But you can’t even stand against one hunter. Pathetic."
The arena erupted again, not with controlled entertainment, but with chaos. Cheers, curses, whispers of rebellion. Seeds of doubt, planted in fertile ground.
Ling Yu’s smirk curved cruelly.
The atmosphere in the pit shifted.
For a brief moment, it had looked like Ling Yu’s defiance would send the lords scattering like roaches under firelight. Zhan Lei was utterly humiliated, and Bai Mei was bloodied, two down in the span of breaths.
But the truth was, these lords were not simply decadent parasites.
They were predators in their own right.
Ling Yu could see it now, in the way their gazes sharpened. In the subtle shifts of posture. They’d been lounging, laughing, feeding on bloodsport because they could.